Anatomy of a Technocratic Centrist

When management replaces politics and consent becomes optional.

At twenty minutes to five on the morning of 24 June 2016, the BBC’s David Dimbleby announced the result of Britain’s referendum on Europe.

“The British people have spoken,” he said. “The answer is: we’re out.”

Sterling went into freefall. Remain-voting politicians reacted with open incredulity – some with something close to grief. “God help this country,” tweeted one of them – a sentiment shared by practically everyone in the establishment.

Brexit marked the start of something that remains unresolved, and that has arguably done lasting damage to trust in democratic politics ever since – not just in the UK but across the West. The election of Trump did the same in the US. What helped produce both – and intensified in the aftermath – was a collapse of trust in technocratic governance.

In the years that followed, two different but related grievances solidified into rival expressions of resentment. One side raged at how the public could have got it so wrong. The other at why the political cla…